Los Angeles, June 7 (RHC)-- According to media reports from the United States, President Joe Biden’s bid to reassert leadership in the Americas -- where mistrust of the U.S. runs deep -- has been dealt a blow as several south and central American countries have decided to stay away from a summit in Los Angeles.

Leaders from Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador have rejected to participate in the Americas Summit due to Washington’s policy of exclusion after it refused to invite Venezuela, Nicaragua and Cuba to the gathering.

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador slammed Washington policy of exclusion and said it needs to change its desire to dominate the world without any reason.  “There cannot be an Americas Summit if not all of the continent's countries participate,” López Obrador said Monday, confirming that he will not attend the summit.

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro praised the Mexican president’s “courage and clarity” for choosing not to attend the summit, saying that Washington’s decision to exclude three countries is an “act of discrimination,” which ensures that “the summit will fail.”

Chilean President Gabriel Boric also criticized the U.S. exclusion of South American countries and said that it was “not the right path.”  “We think it’s an error, a mistake,” he told reporters in Ottawa at a news conference with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

“When the United States claims to exclude certain countries from the summit, they’re actually then reinforcing the position that these other countries take in their own countries,” he added.

Trudeau separated his government’s approach from the U.S. policy, saying that “Canada has always had a different position on Cuba than the United States.”